


On Heroism and the Art of Selfishness

by Miss M (missm)



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-05-07
Updated: 2011-05-07
Packaged: 2017-10-19 02:49:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,783
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/196008
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/missm/pseuds/Miss%20M
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's our choices that make us who we are.</p>
            </blockquote>





	On Heroism and the Art of Selfishness

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kelly_chambliss](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kelly_chambliss/gifts).



> Written for the 2010 round of Springtime Gen. My thanks to Tetley for beta-reading.

It always feels strange to attend the funeral of someone younger than you. The fact that said someone had been well over a hundred years old did not change the feeling, although Griselda was well aware of the possibility that she'd be the next one to go. Of course, she'd much prefer to die in her own bed, rather than be AK'ed down from a tower.

Along with her colleagues and wizarding Britain at large, she'd come to pay her last respects to Albus Dumbledore, whom she'd never really stopped thinking of as a brazen, red-haired boy of seventeen, despite knowing that she was probably the only one who still remembered him this way (except for poor old Bathilda, perhaps). The ceremony had been quite lovely, as lovely as funerals can be; Griselda was sure young Albus would have been pleased. At any rate, he was beyond such worries now.

Griselda, on the other hand, worried about the ones he'd left behind.

Although not a member of the Order proper, she was a close ally, and she'd passed on information to them more than once. From the bench she was sitting on, she could recognize several of its members in the scattered crowd, lingering about the burial place like disoriented children, most of them looking quite hapless and forlorn.

A little away from the others, a woman was standing with her back to the others, staring out at the lake. Griselda had been watching her for maybe ten minutes now, and still the woman hadn't budged. It was time to do something.

She got up, wincing a little at her creaking joints, and made her way over to where the woman was standing, a tall, thin figure, dark against the afternoon sky. Not until Griselda was right behind her did the woman move; turning and smiling weakly.

"Professor Marchbanks," she said, holding out her hand.

Griselda took it, nodding. "Professor McGonagall."

The Deputy Headmistress of Hogwarts was dressed in black, stern and serious as befitted the situation. Griselda's eyes were not what they'd used to be, but she noticed the fine streaks of silver in McGonagall's hair and thought of how much and how little time had passed since she'd herself supervised this woman's O.W.L.s, more than a fifty years ago.

"My condolences," she said, not letting go of McGonagall's hand. "I know you were close."

A half-smile passed over McGonagall's face, flimsy and crooked; for a moment, it was as if a mask had cracked open and slid aside to reveal raw anger and pain. "I'm not so sure we were, really. It seems he could never be bothered to trust me." A two-second pause. "But thank you."

"I am staying at the castle for the night," said Griselda. "If you'd like to talk about it..."

"Thank you, but there is no need for that." And the mask was back, and she was her usual self again: Minerva McGonagall, as cold and stern as a Scottish winter. Griselda smiled.

"Walk with me a little while," she said.

~ ~ ~

They strolled slowly along the lakeside, McGonagall tactfully pausing every now and then to make sure Griselda could follow. Birds were flying over their heads, screaming in their insistent manner, almost making Griselda want to remove her hearing-aid Charm. (But only almost, as she tended to reserve her near-deafness for people she did not like.)

After a while, McGonagall broke the silence. "I am sorry for what I said earlier," she said, her tone stiff. "You must think me very callous."

Griselda shook her head. "Dear girl," she said. "I think nothing of the sort."

They'd reached a place where the lakeside curved inwards, secluded by small bushes; a peaceful spot. Griselda indicated that she'd like to sit down, and waited until McGonagall had Transfigured a large stone into a cushioned bench before speaking again.

"You will be Headmistress now, will you not?"

McGonagall made a non-committal move of her head. "I suppose so. Unless someone else gets the job, that is." She glanced around, warily. "You never know, these days."

Griselda nodded. "But is that what you'd like to do?"

Upon seeing McGonagall's uncomprehending look, she chuckled.

"Listen to me, child," she said. "I know a thing or two about making choices. You have already made yours, or most of them, but not all. You don't have to stay here. You don't have to care about what the world wants."

McGonagall said nothing for a while. Then, in a hushed voice, "It's my career. It's my life."

Griselda nodded again. "But is that all?"

No answer.

Griselda whipped out a pack of Cesare's Cinematic Cigarillos and lit one, offering the pack to Minerva, who shook her head no. They sat there in silence for a few minutes, watching the violet smoke wind its way through the air, taking on the shape of small figures: trolls, bears, dragons.

"I was like you when I was younger," Griselda said after a while. "Always concerned with proving myself. I wanted to do my job, and to do it better than everybody else, to show I could. I wanted to do my duty. But now... I think that when we reach a certain age, we are allowed to be selfish."

McGonagall smiled, faintly. "You do not seem the selfish sort, to me."

Griselda twirled her cigarillo between her fingers, the motion almost second-nature to her after all these years of smoking. "Oh, to the contrary, dear child. I'm the most egotistical sort you can imagine. At least, that's what your old acquaintance Augusta Longbottom likes to tell me. We were great friends, her mother and I," she added wistfully. "Rather too great, some people thought."

McGonagall raised an eyebrow, but did not comment.

"The point is," said Griselda, "that there is much to be said for not being tied to a school for the rest of one's life. I was lucky. When I was young, witches couldn't even take their N.E.W.T.s --- due to Gordon's Act of 1840, as you will remember. But I was lucky. I earned a scholarship so I could go to Hall's College in the States, the sole witches' only school at the time." She smiled again, following the smoky dream-shapes with her eyes. "The best years of my life, I daresay."

"But you came back afterwards," said McGonagall. "May I ask why?"

Griselda shrugged. "As I said, I wanted to prove myself. I wanted to show them the absurdity of their laws and rules and norms. I managed to get a position at the Examinations Authority, and I worked like a madwoman. Day and night. In the end, the Act was revoked, and it became possible for witches to pursue a higher education without having to leave the country. Ever since, I've been devoting myself to academia, rather than to activism." She looked into McGonagall's eyes. "What about you?"

McGonagall raised her chin. "I've been doing my job."

"And most excellently," said Griselda. "But you... I remember your results, back then. They were outstanding. I remember hoping you'd go into independent research. I wanted to see you publish."

A silence again. The sky was growing pink above them.

"I like teaching," McGonagall finally said. "It's useful work. And with all those things happening... With You-Know-Who back... I can't quit. There are children who need me." She pursed her lips. "And I'm too old, anyway."

Griselda lit herself another cigarillo. "Too old for what?"

McGonagall looked away.

"I understand that you are worried," Griselda said, blowing out the smoke with great relish. "Many things have happened in the field of Transfiguration while you have been busy teaching eleven-year-olds to turn buttons into snails, that's true. But you are not too old. Look at me!" she went on, waving her hands. "I did my best research after turning ninety. And you would not have the problems all the young upstarts are facing. You have experience, connections, integrity..."

"Which is why I'd no doubt find it hard to concentrate on doing academic scholarship while the Death Eaters are taking over the country."

"You could go abroad."

"What for?" McGonagall's mouth twitched into a humorless smile. "As I said, my life is here."

Griselda shrugged. "For now, at least... But are you honestly prepared to be Headmistress? It is a challenging position, especially during these times. You'd be watched closely. And that," she added slyly, "goes for your private life as well. Nobody cares much about whom a spinster schoolteacher brings to her bed as long as she is discreet about it, but the Headmistress of Hogwarts can't afford to be suspected of corrupting innocent youth."

Putting out her cigarillo, she shrugged again. "It's the hypocrisy of our society, my dear. Spend a hundred years in celibacy and no one will raise an eyebrow; live your life as an adult with wants and needs, and risk being condemned by all sorts of busybodies who think they are perfectly entitled to meddle in your private affairs."

She watched McGonagall's face grow pale, the already-pursed mouth narrowing into a fine, fine line. Griselda reached out to pat the woman's knee, taking care to do so gently. Then she lit herself another cigarillo, and waited.

"No," said McGonagall at last. "I will not leave."

Would not, not could not. Griselda smiled.

"Minerva was the goddess of wisdom," she observed.

McGonagall nodded. The color had returned to her cheeks. "But also the goddess of heroism."

"Not old enough for selfishness, then?"

Griselda held out her pack of cigarillos again; this time, Minerva took one. A thin smile lurked about her lips as she lit it with a light tap of her wand. "I suppose not."

The smoke unfurled in front of them, painting scenes that mingled and dispersed and reappeared. Griselda squinted at the sky. It was time to go back soon, she mused. After all, her mission here was done. Still, there was one last thing she wanted to hear.

"And if they appoint someone else?" she asked, her tone casual as she turned to look at McGonagall. "You know there is a real risk that may happen. Imagine the Ministry sends some dodgy character of who-knows-what political persuasion... What would you do then?"

Again, a half-smile, but there was nothing flimsy about it this time. Instead, there was steel in McGonagall's eyes as she put out her cigarillo and rose from the bench. "I'd have to make his life hell, wouldn't I?"

Griselda laughed, coughing on the remains of the smoke. "Dear girl," she said as McGonagall took her by the arm to help her up. "I would expect nothing less from you."


End file.
